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Topic: Raw MIlk (Read 2303 times)

Cow Shares is almost legal in Kentucky. It is out of the Senate and now in the House. Needless to say, the opponents of raw milk (i.e. big producers) are coming out of the woodwork with all sorts of propaganda.

Great quality website . . . after watching some of the videos all I can say is I'm glad I don't drink milk (OK just a little in tea) and that I now think all milk should be outlawed . . . raw, pasteurized, cow, goat, human for babies everything!

I think urban farm or hobby farm magazine had a great article about milk raw vs. pasturized. the raw advocate had a great argument about chicken an the food borne illnesses that come from consuming chicken annualy, all food has the potential! Raw milk from a commercial dairy is scary! from an dirty small farm scary... but toxic? not always the Govs argument was that people argue its there right to choose, but the gov has the authority to shut down restraunts for food safety and you dont have the right to eat there anyways!

I think that it should be regulated tested monitored and accept that everything has its risks!

It boils down to us having breed the intelligence out of our herd. Get good information and apply it to your life-no need to pass a law to do it. Use good common sense and a little self education. More fuel to the fire attached..

There certainly are some horrific stories there. Seems to me that the problem is that where the sale of raw milk for human consumption is illegal (as it is here in Australia) people buy it undercover - I'm told you can buy milk here which is sold for bathing, and an acquaintance told me that she gets it from a dairy under the pretext of feeding it to her (nonexistent) greyhounds. If it was legal there would be a requirement to maintain a good level of hygiene etc and we could buy it with confidence. Margaret

I agree with Margaret's points. Production of good clean raw milk requires that sufficient attention be paid to the health of the animals and the details of hygiene. I am very comfortable with the idea of raw milk as I grew up drinking raw milk, and now milk my own cow and drink her milk raw. (It's very very good milk. ) However, since there is no local licensing/inspection for raw milk dairies, I would be very cautious about buying raw milk from someone else. I would want to know their milking and washing routine, take a look at their livestock, and enquire about the feeding regime. It would make a lot of sense to have some reasonable inspection/licensing procedure. The question is, what is reasonable?

If it was so deadly then how do babies, calves etc survive! I am not arguing that there is not potential issues and facts and..... out there, I am arguing quantity and bias, who has the money to do studies and decide what outcome is made from the facts?I do think it is dangerous for mass market and common sense does not exist in the general public, individuals perhaps. I am not against regulating commercial sales, herd sizes volume I just think total bans are stupid an dill concieved.

Here in Oregon there is not a total ban. There is a 'small farm' exemption for milk sales. Three or less cows is a small farm with no licensing or inspection requirements for milk sales. Milk can be sold from the farm premises, but cannot be advertised. No farm with more livestock than the small farm limit has a legal mechanism for selling raw milk. The small farm exemption seems quite reasonable to me. (Small footprint, producers and consumers must know each other.) A mechanism for raw milk sales from larger dairies via licensing and inspection could make raw milk more widely available though.

But volume in my oppinion leads to issues. more opportunity for contamination! I think thats is a good idea especialy no advertising that means if i wanna buy itI need to find it, meaning your farm then I have a chance to inspect if i wanna eat/drink something from there!

I am a total advocate on the consumption of fresh raw milk and cheese products. I also believe that you can limit your exposure to sources of contamination(environmental or man made) by sourcing from smaller herds. But to legislate it in such a way as to allow farms of smaller herds to slip through the cracks without oversight can also lead to problems UNLESS the proprietors of these farms are also educated, diligent, and forthright about the handling of their product. Ultimately the process need to be one of vigil on both the parts of the farmers and consumers. Only once this pact can be consummated in certainty can we hope for less government intervention and a freer source of this delectable and nutritious food. Again..education is the key.

I was raised on raw milk and everyone in our neiborhood was. All we did was milk the cow and pour it through a huge coffee filter. I never heard of anyone getting sick from it. There seems to be a higher incidence of things like e-coli etc. Heck we had e-coli contamination in lettuce a s few months back. Should we outlaw lettuce now? I think contamination to our food is a serious issue but to outright ban something because a few people got sick when the soruces can be easily traced is ridiculas. I have to wonder being that one artical stated that 70% of the people that got sick had eatten Queso Fresco if it was from the same group that was making it in there bath tub that caused a bunch of people to get sick. Anyone can make data say what they want it too - without specific details tying the facts to specific things it doesn't tell us much. Those in favor have their data those against have theirs. Are they both wrong? No - it just the way you ask the questions and interpret the answers.

Deb - you are absolutely right, anyone can make data say what they want it to. The problem is that the website that I referenced in the beginning is being referenced by the anti raw milk lobby. And legislators will err on the side of caution (and money).

Farmstead milk is not the only potential problem. Even if it's a little contaminated, you can drink it and have no ill effects, just like people have done for hundreds of years. That's called a sub-clinical contamination because there are just not enough bacteria to cause illness. However, if the contamination in that milk is allowed to multiply then there can be all sorts of health risks.

In peak conditions, bacteria will double their population every 20 minutes. So, let's start with a sub-clinical contamination of just 10 bacteria in 5 gallons of milk. After just 12 hours, that population can grow to 687,194,767,360. At 24 hours, the number is 188, 894,659,314,786,000,000,000. I think that's 188 gazillion.

I point this out, because problems can happen many different ways after the milk leaves the farm.

This multiplication can happen during transportation if the milk is not kept cold enough. Milk haulers have to keep records and maintain a "chain of temperature" log. I don't know if there is a national standard, but here in Kentucky, milk can never get above 40F. The "chain" includes dairy farm to raw milk hauler to processor to distributor to grocery store to consumer and then home. Lots of opportunity for improper handling.

Contamination has the potential to go wild during cheese making, but soft, fresh cheeses are the highest risk. The temperatures are the perfect environment for bacteria to multiply. So it's extremely important that the milk used is free of pathogens. However, raw milk also has native bacteria that can out compete any pathogens. And of course pathogens can be introduced by unsanitary working conditions during the cheese making.

The site data does not even attempt to trace the contaminations to post milking processing or unsanitary manufacturing. So the numbers cited in that website are misleading and they tend to blame "raw milk" as the sole source of the problem and legislators will believe what they read.

I just dont understand why "PEOPLE" are sooo stupid?And government is like a retirement home for the dumbest of them!

You get people in a group and they are no smarter then a group of cows, and then we blame everything but ourselves when things go wrong!

I like government rules they do protect us from certain nefarious people and practices but I dont think they need to meddle in my everyday! I ll pay taxes for road, police etc, make standards on what is safe give me the info, inspect facilities and then post that info, but beyond that stop telling me how to live.